Small Decrease in Mortgage Activity for July

The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume by the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) weekly survey, saw a slight month-over-month decline of 0.8% on a seasonally adjusted (SA) basis; compared to July 2023, the index increased by 0.5%. The Purchase Index declined by 4.8%, while the Refinance Index increased by 5.8%, month-over-month. On a yearly basis, the Purchase Index decreased by 13.9%, while the Refinance Index increased by 33.9%.

Meanwhile, the average monthly 30-year fixed mortgage rate continued to decline for three straight months with July seeing the largest decrease of 10 basis points (bps) to land an at 6.88% in July. The current rate is also lower than last July by 6 bps.

The average loan size for the total market (including purchases and refinances) is down by 1.5% from June to $367,900 on a non-seasonally adjusted (NSA) basis in July. Similarly, the month-over-month change for purchase loans decreased 1.6% to an average size of $424,200, while refinance loans increased by 2.5% to an average of $275,325. The average loan size for an adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) decreased by 2.5% for the same period, from $1.03 million to $1.01 million.